1. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT: a path less taken A PRESENTATION TO THE ITES PERSONNEL Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;

2. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT  Time set, Trajectory and Introduction  Information Flow –Pathway –Tools  LTER Culture  Other Projects

3. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Time set The Center for Energy and Environmental Research (CEER) was the official name of the Nuclear Center in Puerto Rico Terrestrial Ecology Division (TED) was part of CEER when it was dissolved in the 1990’s The Puerto Rico Nuclear Center (PRNC) was created in 1957

4. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Trajectory in Time The National Science Foundation (NSF) granted TED the Long Term-Ecological Research program (LTER) in 1988 Luquillo LTER (LUQ) was the first LTER site in the Tropics In 1988 the first information manager and data entry person were recruited by TED TED hired the current information manager in 1989 and the current data entry person in 1995, and they both stayed

5. IM staff has always been constituted by: An information manager One or two data entry person One or two students

6. Assist the scientific community in their endeavor to understand nature and make sure that their products are widely available to the present generation as well as future ones INFORMATION MANAGEMENT Introduction : Mission Then took the other, as just as fair And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that, the passing there Had worn them really about the same,

7. Scientific needs and new technologies: Changes in procedures Science methods Technology INFORMATION MANAGEMENT Introduction : Mission And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.

8. Data entry protocols Quality Control (QC) methods Communication with scientific staff Produce metadata INFORMATION MANAGEMENT Introduction : Processes = data about data I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: two roads diverged in a wood, and I I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. Robert Frost... The Road Not Taken

9. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Advantages MINIMIZED  Errors are  Facilitates:  Analyses  Cross-site investigation  Long-Term life of data  Promotes the establishments of standard procedures MMeasurements: units MManagement: data structures

10. Field and / or Lab,  Office  Web or Plone  Analisys  Publications (Flowchart) (Flowchart) INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Flow of Information

11. Receive, entry, quality control (QC), report, and archiving. –Filing and labling –Loging: project status –Entry : using spreadsheets and/or database programs Saved in database format Information Flow

12. –QC:Data correction Double check in IM Reports –Backups : 2 different external media hardcopy archival –Data delivery (via email or Plone) Information Flow

13. –Data Entry sheets generation Illustration of data entry sheets evolution in time Information Flow

14. Example: CTE Seedling data entry sheet evolution: –June 30, 2003

15. Example: CTE Seedling data entry sheet evolution: –Nov 13, 2007 Information Flow

16. –Data Entry sheets generation Used for comparison with previous data at the field Ease process of electronic data entry Facilitate registration of data in the field, e.g. unit of measurement taken (cm vs m) Information Flow

17. Why are IM procedures important? … A centralized office for management …  Provides organization  Prevents data loss and repetition  Makes sure good quality metadata is in place Information Flow: Conclusion

18. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Tools The selection of the computer program depends on the type of information to be entered

19. Data Base Management Systems (DBMS) vs vsSpreadsheets DBMS facilitate synthesis by standardizing data columns DBMS usually export data more accurately DBMS provide more powerful searching tools Spreadsheets facilitate data entry and visualization The computer expertise needed to use a spreadsheets is less INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Tools

20. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : The LTER Culture What is so peculiar about the LTER? In the science component… CCollaborative research is developed  Centralized working hypothesis approach to collaboration SSpread all over the world

21. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : LUQ IM in the LTER Culture

22.  Short-Term data may be just part of the story

23. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : LUQ IM in the LTER Culture  Data without metadata is worthless..\lterdb114\meta data\lterdb114.ht m

24. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : LUQ IM in the LTER Culture  Fully compliant with the LTER Network minimum standards  LUQ developed metadata standards as early as 1990

25. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Other Projects - Buchanan Antilles Middle School web page: http://luq.lternet.edu/outreach/IMandAMS.htm http://luq.lternet.edu/outreach/IMRemoteSensingandSchoolComm.htm  Schoolyard  Community special projects - Colegio creativo de Puerto Rico web site and data:

26. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT : Other Projects  International presentations and workshops Mexico Venezuela Costa Rica Taiwan  Collaboration with other agencies Forest Service: Creation of a Research web with an IM component  Other ITES’ Programs: ITES Scientists’ publication data base Website: http://www.ites.upr.edu/